The Final Scenes a Crime

Jeff Bridges, Peter Green, MĂ¤dchen Amick and Morris Chestnut are just some of the star names who appear in "Scenes of the Crime" a movie based on a true story, but despite a lot of well known names and faces I had never heard of the movie. Now that is not unusual, I admit that certain movies have passed me by over the years but what is surprising is that this movie seems to have passed everyone else by because despite the star power it went straight to DVD. Now you may wonder why and as you watch this movie unfold you will be constantly asking yourself why because it seems so good. But then right at the end you learn why and in fairness it makes sense but it doesn't stop it from being one disappointing movie which had done so well to create an intriguing set up.

Lenny Burroughs (Jon Abrahams - Texas Rangers) is about to get married and he is trying to earn some extra cash for the wedding but also to set up his own garage. It is why he does driving for small time hood Rick (Peter Greene - Ticker) who has him go on a run with him to take Jimmy Berg (Jeff Bridges - Arlington Road) hostage as Jimmy is reported to have stolen money from Rick's boss Mr. Morrison (Brian Goodman). But not only does Rick seem to be going against his orders, he also ends up killed when he is run over after stepping out of the van. That leaves Lenny in a strange situation as he hold Jimmy hostage whilst Jimmy tries to persuade him to let him go whilst Mr. Morrison calls in orders for him to sit tight.

"Scenes of the Crime" starts a little slowly as we have some set up scenes such as Lenny racing his Ford Mustang to a disjointed scene which sees the money being stolen. It doesn't bode well but thankfully after a needless sex scene between Lenny and his girlfriend things are put into motion with Lenny stuck in the van with Jimmy and having to keep his wits about him as he tries to work out what to do. In doing so it creates a lot of intrigue with this set up of Lenny being over his head with the pressure mounting on him the longer they are stuck in the van. We also have intrigue as we discover that Rick was double crossing his boss which is why the van is in the wrong place which adds to the mystery of who was he working for. Plus we have lots of characters such as Mr. Parker who lives in the flat opposite and seems not to be with it but pays two workmen lots of money not to cover his windows up for work as he needs to see out.

All of this is great and with a lot of recognizable faces such as Morris Chestnut as Ray who runs the nearby corner store deli you are glued to what is happening. The whole thing revolves not only about what is Lenny going to do but what with the other people do as the tension increases such as when a workman sees blood from Rick's dead body how will Jimmy's heavy Seth deals with him. But then after just over an hour of brilliant, intense drama we get the resolution and either money ran out or the writers went on strike. The ending is seriously disappointing and whilst it may be based on a true story it could have been done so much better.

Now that leads me to what is curious about "Scenes of the Crime" as it has a lot of star power and all the actors play their parts well from Jeff Bridges as Jimmy to R. Lee Ermey as Mr. Parker. But in the end many of these fine actors end up in parts which have absolutely no importance. That really sucks as you get all this build up, all these characters and then nothing.

What this all boils down to is that "Scenes of the Crime" feels like a movie which ran out of money and time, making it a movie which despite doing a fantastic job of setting up a drama then messes it up with a terrible ending.